The finished product
I LOVE cooking for friends.
Tonight I am cooking for one of my best friends, Tash. Tash cooks the best traditional Thai food I have ever tasted. She will cook me a Thai Red Curry and in return I cook her Piri Chicken and Pastas and Tapas etc.
I love Tash’s cooking and I think she loves mine too.
Tonight is Pomodoro Pasta night with Italian Sausage. It is one of my most favorite healthy recipes and it really has so many good things going for it. For a start its low fat, reduced calorie and delicious. It is also full of vitamin C and other great stuff such as essential fatty acids.
Here it is in the early stages:
Fresh basil and olives
My house is currently filled with a beautiful smell of basil and garlic as it simmers on the hob to bring out the flavor.
Here is my not so secret recipe:
- 2 tins of chopped tomatoes.
- 2 whole vine tomatoes.
- 1 tsp tomato puree.
- 3 whole garlic cloves.
- a generous pinch of fresh basil.
- paprika (1 tablespoon).
- a pinch of hot chili powder to taste.
- 2 bell peppers (I use yellow and red).
- 1 whole red onion cut in half.
- salt and pepper.
- 2 chicken stock cubes.
- 6 halved black olives in brine.
First of all prep the veg. Make sure its all washed and peeled. Preheat the oven to a high temperature and turn to medium just before you roast the veg in the oven. Put all your veg, roughly chopped, into a roasting tray and season with salt and pepper to draw out the moisture. I also like to stuff one of the tomatoes with fresh garlic to bring out a sweet pungent flavor. Roast until the peppers have a blackened edge.
Roasted veg
In a big pot (I use a large enamel stock pot), add all the roasted veg to the tinned tomatoes. At this point you can add all the other ingredients. Put a lid on and allow to simmer on a very low heat for half an hour. This again draws out the flavor.
Allow to cool to room temperature.
Check that your mix is fully cooled and then blend down until fine.
I love to add this sauce to fine ribbon pasta (Mafalda Corta variety) and I usually add a protein such as tuna, Italian lean sausage or chicken. Adjust your calories to whatever you put in.
This recipe is big enough for about 10 portions of sauce so freeze some down (it lasts for 1 month) and use it when you want to rustle up some tasty fast food. Cooking with no oil as I do one portion of my recipe (1 tenth of the whole recipe) has about 40 kcal and 0.2g fat! It also makes a great pizza sauce.
Use fresh herbs if you can, but dried can work too. I grow my own on a window sill.
My fresh herbs
Here are my cooked little Italian links, but you can use any lean sausage (remember to add your calories for any added protein and also the pasta).
Little links
This recipe is © Laura Wild @ Skinny Kitchen Chef. All rights and the Skinny Kitchen Chef logo and brand are reserved.
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